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How to cool my little workshop? Will this work Answered

I have my workshop building i am trying to cool without spending a 1000.00 bucks. I havea small chest freezer forget the cubic feet but it is around 2 ft. by 3ft. in size. I was wondering if i fill 75 5 full of water and instal a coil of 100 feet of 3/8 copper tubing in a coil on the inside running to a 36 inch fan with 75 ft of 3/8 coil on the front and set it to pump 32 degree water to the fan . Do you think this woudl bring a 10ft by 16 ft building down from 100 to 80 degrees ? This would probably be cheaper on electricity over all than a a/c if i could afford one. Can anyone share there thoughts?

11 Replies

Not knowing where you live, this may or may not be worthwhile but you might consider using an evaporative (swamp) cooler. So long as the dew point is below 55 degrees F, they are quite effective. I used to use several side draft units mounted on dollies to help cool my millwork shop and they could be easily moved where needed. A recirculating pump and a garden hose to refill the water pan occasionally and you're all set. And, they are relatively inexpensive to operate and maintain.

Suggestion: Depending on what you're doing, you may not have to cool the whole workshop as heavily. I know folks who have hung roll-down plastic partitions in their workshops for dust control. Seems to me that these might help to contain/direct cool air as well.

For that matter, old technology such as ceiling fans can help control workshop temperatures. Swamp coolers can be very effective if the air starts out relatively dry. Insulating the workshop could make a huge difference (and would help you in winter too).

And as someone pointed out elsewhere, neck coolers -- basically, cloth tubes of water-absorbing polymer which you hang around your neck and which cool themselves by evaporation -- can make hot temperatures MUCH more bearable by cooling the brain's blood supply. (And they're cheap -- I just paid my local 4H club $5 for one.) Of course if you're concerned about cooling the material rather than yourself that won't work, but it's worth considering.

(Heck, just a wet bandana wrapped around the forehead can help a lot.)

I don't think it's all that unknown. The air conditioner and the fridge are built around exactly the same heat pump technology. Even though the freezer is designed to bring its "room" temperature lower, I really think this is going to be like trying to use an AC intended for a 16 square foot room to cool your 160 square foot building.

Using machines outside their designed range usually makes them less efficient.

You'd probably do much better just getting a couple of old window air conditioners from Freecycle.

I think you would be better off buying a small window unit air conditioner. Depending on where you arfe located they can be just about anywhere (Walmart, Lowes, Aldi, etc). A 5000 BTU unit can be purcased from Home Depot for less than $100.

Yes it will cool. You need to answer how well and how much ??Copper tube is expensive. How are you going to cool the soon to be warm water in the chest freezer ?How many CFM is the fan ?Have you done the power analysis :Fan power = ?Pump power = ?Chest freezer power = ?

I have not complete d each yet. I have looked a t a large enough window unit to run but will require a considerable amount more power than my preliminary numbers show. I will complete the pump info this evening and will have a ll the numbers together .

As far as the box water getting hot i will have to trial and error this one. If i start with nearly frozen water i really have no idea how many hours it will take to get the water hot. My typical time span in the building is no more than 4 to 5 hours a day .